When the nation’s Catholic bishops gather in Atlanta next week (June 13-15) for their annual spring meeting, a top agenda item will be assessing the reforms they adopted 10 years ago as revelations of widespread sexual abuse of children by priests consumed the church. But is anything different — in the church or in the country — 10 years later? Here’s a look at what has changed, and what has not…

392 Austrian Catholic priests, or almost 10 per cent of the 4,200 in the country are calling for the abolition of celibacy; for married clergy to be allowed; for shared Communion with remarried people and other Christians. Three-quarters of people polled in the traditionally Catholic country backed the priests’ “Call to Disobedience”…

The number of people leaving the Roman Catholic Church in Germany jumped by nearly 50 percent in 2010 as an abuse scandal widened, new data showed Friday. Some 181,000 people quit their memberships last year, up from 124,000 in 2009, official numbers released by Germany’s Roman Catholic Church showed…

Discovery Channel is teaming with the Vatican for an unprecedented new series hunting the deadliest catch of all: Demons. The Exorcist Files will recreate stories of real-life hauntings and demonic possession, based on cases investigated by the Catholic Church. The project includes access into the Vatican’s case files, as well as interviews with the organization’s top exorcists — religious experts who are rarely seen on television…

Cathy Byrd’s 2-year-old son, Christian Haupt, was a baseball prodigy who spent countless hours pitching and hitting balls, and insisted on wearing a baseball uniform every day. In 2011 his outstanding abilities even landed the boy a small part in the Adam Sandler movie That’s My Boy. But in her new memoir, The Boy Who Knew Too Much, Byrd shares an even more improbable story that even she had trouble believing at first: She claims that Christian was the reincarnation of baseball legend Lou Gehrig, who played for the Yankees nearly a century ago…

Whether you are pro-vaccine, anti-vaccine, or somewhere in the middle, everyone should watch this interview with Robert Kennedy, Jr. It appears in Part 3 of the new 9-part documentary “Vaccines Revealed.” Kennedy, who vaccinated all six of his children, describes what he discovered about vaccinations after being dragged into the controversy. Known primarily for his work as an environmental activist and attorney specializing in environmental law, Kennedy is now spending all of his time attempting to force various government and corporate entities to come clean about the greed and corruption that has been driving the vaccine industry and publicly debate this important topic…

For many in the United States, Columbus Day is just another holiday. It is a time to spend with family and friends, an opportunity to take a short vacation, an extra day of rest from a long work week, or it is the last chance for a barbecue before winter. But for others, it is a sharp and painful reminder that history has betrayed and forgotten the contributions of their people, the lives lost, and a rich culture that pre-dated colonization.

From the moment a sailor aboard the Pinta sighted land from the sea, on October 12, 1492, the course of indigenous history was forever changed. Upon landing on what is now the Bahamas, once known as Guanahani, Columbus encountered indigenous peoples of the Lucayan, Taíno or Arawak, nations. Peaceful and friendly, Columbus and his Spanish explorers manipulated their hospitality and mercilessly slaughtered, enslaved, and stole lands in the name of the Spanish crown. He wrote of them in his journal, “They ought to make good and skilled servants, for they repeat very quickly whatever we say to them”…

Dr. Dave: What’s the relationship between dreams and NDEs — Near Death Experiences?

Monika Wikman: Well, if you work with your dreams it can really help you to be open and more conscious to be able to track when you’re having near-death experiences, so that is like literally exercising a muscle. It’s a part of us that can learn to be aware and hold consciousness around this field — this phenomenological field of where symbols and images come from. So, I think for people who have near death experiences… many people have them but they don’t remember them and how sad that is. So, they come back, they don’t remember what happened but if you can remember it — come back — then you have a solid sense of presence and even a teaching that came to you, through you, about while you’re still in your incarnation. So dreams are a way to learn how to tend that border between worlds and also have an easier time when it comes to either literally dying or getting into near death experiences. That was certainly true for me and it’s certainly been true for people I’ve worked with.

This is a transcript of Dateline’s 1998 undercover report on Gabriel of Sedona (aka Gabriel of Urantia). In addition to a transcribed copy of this report, this page also includes links to the full video version, as well as an audio version.

Around the world and in the United States, where the faith was founded, the Mormon Church is grappling with a wave of doubt and disillusionment among members who encountered information on the Internet that sabotaged what they were taught about their faith…

On October 17th, near-death experiencer and best-selling author, Anita Moorjani, hosted a one-hour chat session with some of her Facebook followers. Here are some of the insightful questions and answers that arose from this session…

As part of a panel discussion at the International Association for Near-Death Studies (IANDs) 2014 Conference, healthcare professionals discussed how to better approach patients reporting near-death experiences (NDEs)…

The Vatican Apostolic Library, founded in 1451 and considered one of the world’s most important research libraries, is hoping in the next four years to archive its entire collection of 82,000 manuscripts, comprising more than 41 million pages…

Playing off the idea of using social media to summon crowds for parties or mischief, mobs of Buffalo-area Roman Catholics have been filling pews and lifting spirits at some of the city’s original, now often sparsely attended, churches. On a given Sunday, participants attend Mass en masse at a church they’ve picked in an online vote and promoted through Facebook and Twitter. Visitors experience the architecture, heritage and spirit of the aging houses of worship and the churches once again see the numbers they were built for, along with a helpful bump in donations when the collection baskets are passed…

The saint-like image of a hooded woman looms out from the movie poster, her arms outstretched as a divine light bursts from the sky. A message written above is simple and unambiguous: “You Will Believe.” So goes the promotional campaign for the forthcoming Hollywood blockbuster Mary Mother of Christ. Mary Mother of Christ is one of a series of unashamedly Christian biblical epics due to appear next year, marking an unprecedented overture by Hollywood to America’s evangelical heartland…

A collection of reports that accuse Mother Teresa of failing to be the humanitarian saint she was widely perceived to be. The allegations include accepting money from corrupt sources, keeping secret bank accounts, misusing millions of dollars in donations (money that could have been used to alleviate poverty or improve the conditions of her hospices was used, instead, to open new convents, increase missionary work, and fund other Vatican projects), refusing to help the needy when they approached the sisters at the wrong time according to the prescribed schedule, discouraging sisters from seeking medical training to deal with the illnesses they encountered (with the justification that God empowers the weak and ignorant), the imposition of “unjust” punishments on sisters (such as being transferred away from their friends), and keeping sisters in check by prohibiting the reading of secular books and newspapers, and emphasizing obedience over independent thinking and problem-solving… This post also includes Time Magazine’s August 2007 article on “Mother Teresa’s Crisis of Faith.”

After a successful launch in Great Britain, dozens of gatherings dubbed “atheist mega-churches” are springing up around the U.S.. The movement is fueled by social media and spearheaded by two prominent British comedians. Called “Sunday Assembly”, the new movement’s motto is “Live Better, Help Often, Wonder More”…

In The Kind Diet, actress, activist, and committed conservationist Alicia Silverstone shares the insights that encouraged her to swear off meat and dairy forever, and outlines the spectacular benefits of adopting a plant-based diet, from effortless weight loss to clear skin, off-the-chart energy, and smooth digestion. She explains how meat, fish, milk, and cheese — the very foods we’ve been taught to regard as the cornerstone of good nutrition — are actually the culprits behind escalating rates of disease and the cause of dire, potentially permanent damage to our ecology…